The Physics of Differences and Similarities
by McChanged
Summary: Because he was left standing in his proverbial wedding dress, too, and she refuses to let him beat her at anything. Even if it’s just a race to well-adjusted.
1. Chapter 1

Title: The Physics of Differences

Rating: K+ for a small amount of swearing

A/N: Ok so I have absolutely no idea where this came from but I'm pretty sure I have fallen in love with this fic. I also have no idea where the title came from but I found it interesting, so it's a different style of writing for me and I won't use it all the time but for this story it seemed to fit. Anyway please review because it's my birthday tomorrow and an inbox full of reviews will make my day.

Disclaimer: The papers seem to have gotten lost in the mail, so not yet.

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He's Mark Sloan and he doesn't fall in love. Well, actually he has, but only once and he made a promise never to do it again. Falling in love made things complicated and hard, and he's Mark Sloan and he doesn't do complicated or hard. Well, maybe he does because he did Addison and she was all complications and sharp edges, but that's out of the context of what he was thinking and crap, now he sounds like Grey with the rambling and the awkwardness, not to mention the fact that he's standing there _not _answering her question and she's glaring and this could only end really badly. Plus she's got this whole my-cheeks-are-turning-red-but-I'm-going-to-act-angry-instead thing going on and it's getting kind of scary.

She's Christina Yang and she doesn't fall in love. Well, actually she has, but only once and she made a promise never to do it again. Falling in love makes people say and do stupid things and she's Christina Yang and she doesn't say or do stupid things. Well maybe she does, because she agreed to marry Burke and that was stupid, and she said she loved him and that was stupid, but that's beside the point and really this is his fault because he's kind of just staring at her and she knows she's glaring. But the time it's taking him to answer her stupid question, and the way his eyes sort of burn into her soul is causing her to feel all soft and giggly and that's an Izzie thing to do and it's pissing her off. Plus she's pretty sure she's blushing and the last person she's seen do that was Bambi, which makes everything that much more irritating.

He really has no idea where he got the idea to kiss her, but he's doing it and suddenly her backs against a wall and her fingers are fumbling for his zipper and he's starting to think it was his best idea ever.

She really has no idea why she's letting him kiss her but his hands feel so good running through her hair and this is the best she's felt in months, so she wraps her legs around his waist and smirks when he groans. Then she suggests they move to her place because she's absolutely positive she can get a STD from the on-call room beds.

He's pretty sure he's in love with the woman sleeping next to him. He's really tying to decide if he should just get up now but nixes the idea because she's Christina and an image of her kicking his ass for even considering her the kind of girl he can bang and then leave, so he relaxes back against his pillow and pray to God she won't kick his ass for _staying_.

She has really perfected her skill for pretending to be asleep while waiting for whatever random hook-up she had the night before to leave but he's snoring softly and she's pretty sure he's not leaving anytime soon. Really, she probably could have kicked him out already but there's this strange feeling she's having that feels a lot like safety but he's Mark and there's_ no_ way he can make her feel safe.

The suns been blinding him through her blinds for the past twenty minutes but he has made no attempt to move, although he really needs to get ready for work. There's a small groan and a very feline-type stretch happening on his right side and suddenly he's staring her straight in the eye and his heart may or may not have stopped.

There's actually something quite amusing with waking up to Mark Sloan in your bed because his hair sticks up in all these strange directions and he looks less like McSteamy and more like McJust-got-rolled-over-by-a-truck but she did _not _expect that giggle to come out of her mouth. But his face breaks into a smile and you really, really want to kiss him so you do because it six in the morning and it's the first time you've woken up happy in forever.

And he's Mark Sloan and she's Christina Yang and nothing will ever be the same again.

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A/N: So I think I might continue this. Hmm tell me what you think please.


	2. emotional progression

_I honestly do love this pairing. Yea I love Lexie and Hunt but this will always be an indulgence for me. I've decided that whatever this is won't be a full story more like a bunch of stories put together and they'll probably contradict each other but I just don't feel like I can make these full stories so enjoy and review please._

_Disclaimer: I don't own._

Mark Sloan falls in love too fast and too hard and has ever since he was five and pulled Jessie Calahan's braids on the playground. So, he does sex with random women from random bars and tried to pick the ones with tan lines on a finger on their left hand because he had less of a chance falling for them.

And then he makes a mistake, picks the wrong married women in the wrong place and gets his heart smashed on concrete in the pouring rain.

(When did he become such a _freaking_ cliché.)

He picked the pieces up and dusted them off and moved to Seattle, where he falls in love all over again with a woman who has no problem ripping it out of his chest again and making sure to hide the pieces in places he'll never find them.

Her name's Cristina Yang. It's whispered in hallways of the hospital when he first moves here. Talk of Burke and hand problems and _bitch_ are uttered behind her back and he almost feels bad for her. Then he meets her and well, he doesn't feel bad.

She's hardcore to a fault, simply put. She holds her own in and out of surgery and she may be Cardio all the way but he still enjoys having her in his O.R.

Burke leaves and things don't change, not for them, really. He's her attending, she's a resident and that's it.

But he's a masochist and so he sleeps with her. There's no ring on her finger but there was _supposed_ to be and that makes her just as unavailable. They don't pretend it's anything more than sex for comfort. And it works just fine for awhile. (But he's a masochist so it doesn't stay just _fine_.)

The relationship shifts subtly until there are more of her clothes in his closet then in hers. She moves around his new apartment like it's hers and he buys the crappy cereal she eats by the box. She doesn't expect special treatment at work because she hates plastics and he doesn't know if he should be offended or relieved.

He'll marry her one day. Of that he's certain.

But before that, there are broken dishes and yelling and more rain. Before that she'll break his heart and he'll break hers and love shouldn't _hurt _this much he thinks.

There's no big event, Burke doesn't come back, and Addison doesn't call professing her love. Their relationship just shifts again and suddenly they spend most of their time fighting and she walks out because it's what she knows how to do, and it's what she's _good _at.

(He doesn't go after her because that's what he knows how to do, what he's _good_ at. He tried with Addison and everyone knows how that ended.)

He doesn't make some big proclamation, but there are two lines on a stick that she whips at him on the middle of an empty hallway and he goes out and buys a calendar.

He calls it emotional progression.


	3. welladjusted

I wrote half of another chapter for a different story, had a random thought, and wrote this in twenty minutes. Aren't you guys lucky. Review please.

Disclaimer: Don't own.

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He's an ass.

He takes his scotch like Derek, and hates his father more than anything. He briefly considered a career in sales when he was twelve, and burns toast every single time he makes it.

She has no idea how he stays in such good shape because his hobbies all seem to require a flat surface or a bed. (Sometimes a wall if he's desperate.)

He refuses to admit that he's getting older, and was once thrown through a glass window at a frat party in college. There's a scar on the back of his head to prove it.

There's more, much more. Thousands of things she can name about the guy who shares her bed and she wonders how this happened.

Burke was a mystery wrapped inside an enigma and she liked it that way because it helped her keep her distance. But with Mark it's different. She can rattle off his top five favorite CD's in order and knows that he gets so uncomfortable at funerals that he tends to avoid them.

When he's nervous he'll roll onto the balls of his feet slightly, and he's terrified of having kids because he doesn't want to be like his father.

It's not _just_ that she knows him, though. It's the same with him.

He _knows_ her and that scares her more than anything else, because she can't stand in the middle of an empty room in her wedding dress again. She won't survive it. She barely did the last time.

Sometimes she doubts _them_. Doubts their ability to make it the distance and then he does something. Opens himself up a little more, shows her another side of his never-ending personality and she stops.

(Because he was left standing in his proverbial wedding dress, too, and she refuses to let him beat her at anything. Even if it's just a race to _well-adjusted.)_

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She's a bitch.

She can hold her own at the bar, and sometimes misses her father so much it's physically painful. When she was four her mother thought she was colorblind because she shied away from everything pink.

She runs early in the morning by herself, and loses _at least_ eight hair bands a day. She's always wanted to be a surgeon and could live off of cereal alone.

She was the over-achiever in college, but was also sleeping with her professor so he thinks it balances out, and she has a scar on the bottom of her foot from the night her dad died because she stepped on glass.

There's more, much more. Thousands of things he can name about the girl who shares his bed and he wonders how this happened.

He knew Addison but that was mostly because of Derek and he figures that doesn't really count. It's different with Cristina, though. He knows that she drinks way too much coffee to not get some sort of buzz from it, and that she can't spell _perpendicular_ on the first try ever.

She's brash and has a hard time not saying what comes to mind when she meets someone for the first time. She's terrified one day she'll wake up and realize she's _just_ like her mother.

It's not _just_ that he knows her though. It's the same with her.

He knows her and that thrills him more than anything else because he's stood in the pouring rain while someone walked away before and he refuses to give her that chance.

He recognizes that sometimes she doubts _them_. Doubts their ability to make it the distance and so he fights it. Opens himself up a little more, shows her another side of his personality and she stops.

Because he was left standing in his proverbial wedding dress, too, and sometimes he thinks she's trying to race him to _well-adjusted_.

(And that is _so _not happening.)


	4. clichés

Really, really short. But the next chapter is almost done so expect an update within the hour. Still review though.

Disclaimer: Don't own.

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She hates clichés. Hates getting flowers and having her cheek kissed in the middle of a crowded hallway and hates the word _relationship_ because it's always followed by _ended _or _damaged_.

Burke was her first. The first time she loved someone with her entire heart since her dad. The first time she let a guy into her apartment. The first time she met the parents of the guy she was sleeping with. The first time she let someone completely in, and she hates him for that. Hates that he pushed her into all of this only to let her down, but most of all she hates that he was the one who broke her heart. (She's always done the breaking.)

And then Mark shows up and she's supposed to hate him but she _can't_. Because she sympathizes, knows what it's like to fall without the thought of consequences and, maybe, that's why he lets him whisper secrets into her neck in the dark of her apartment.

It's not supposed to mean anything. Just sex, and fun and games, and _no-strings attached,_ and no heartbreak, but it doesn't stay that way.

Her life's a never-ending battle to keep away from guys who like to shatter her heart.

(It's an epic failure.)


	5. lattes and redheads

Short and angst-filled and is the first one during these random collection of stories that doesn't end with at least and illusion of a happy ending. Because, really, these too are too much alike and sometimes I have a hard time believing they won't destroy each other.

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Old habits die hard, and he sleeps with the girl who makes his early morning lattes in the morning. She reminds him a little too much like Addison all leggy and hair the color of fire, but when she tells him coolly that this is only for the excitement of screwing on her boss's desk Cristina flashes before his eyes and he can't breathe.

He's standing outside when she gets off that night and at first he thinks she knows, because her eyes are dark and guarded and his head's halfway to his chest when his eyes catch the mark on her neck and she drops her head instead.

He hasn't seen her Wednesday, and hasn't touched her since Tuesday. It's Friday.

He brings his hand up in a half-hearted effort to hide the matching mark on his own neck from the red-head who makes his coffee but her gaze has already flickered down to it and back up to his face.

She doesn't step forward and neither does he.

Betrayal is the name of the game, and they play it well.

(Around them the world continues to spin and the rain continues to pour and he wonders how no one notices the sound of a world shattering.)


End file.
